End of a Legend
by Tildessmoo
Summary: A mysterious storyteller spins tales of the great demon Inu-Yasha, but where did he learn these things that not even Kagome knows?


    He was of average height for a man of the region and time. His face was a bit delicate, but nonetheless definitely masculine and weather-hardened from years on the road. The clothes he wore were nothing exceptional: well-made cotton pants and jacket, sandals, a necklace made of beads and claws, and a faded red cloak made of what was unmistakably wool. The color of his hair and eyes were unremarkable as well, the one being a shiny black and the other a nondescript brown. There was something off about those eyes, though, that an observer could not identify, and his hair was long, longer even than was the fashion in ladies of the emperor's court. These qualities could be easily explained away, however, once one knew the reason for the man's wanderings.  
    He was a storyteller.   
    Now, every storyteller has to have a specialty. The resident storyteller of a village might keep records and myths of the village and the area around it. A court storyteller may specialize in dragons or the great history of the noble or his land. A traveling storyteller often only has four or five stories that he tells particularly well that can be told in return for a night of food and shelter in a village that will likely not see his face again until his stories are forgotten.   
    This storyteller fit none of the normal categories. He knew many tales of all kinds, and he told them all so well that he could easily have gotten a position as a court storyteller. Had, in fact, been offered such a position several times, turning every offer down for the freedom of the road. He had been a wanderer for far too long to give up such a life. However, the stories he knew best, those that he could tell so vividly that it almost seemed as if he had been there, were the legends of the great half-demon Inu Yasha.  
  
End of a Legend  
An _Inu Yasha_ fanfic  
By Dendarin  
  
Part I  
  
    The children gathered around the stranger as he entered the village. He smiled at them and joked, flowing through the main street with his entourage like a festival day parade. The parade ended as the stranger approached the temple in the center of the village with the elderly priestess standing on the porch. "Who be ye, stranger?" she asked.   
    "I am nothing without my stories, milady; as any man is defined by his work, so am I. I am Miyoga, I am Susa-no-o, I am the great Shen-long, I am Inu-Yasha. Call me what you will, milady, for names cheapen the story."   
    "All right, Watuwill." The children chittered and giggled while the man rolled his eyes as if he had heard this response a thousand times before. Which, of course, he had. "My name is Kaede. So, a storyteller, are you? What kinds of stories do you tell?"  
    "Kaede? _The_ Kaede? Younger sister of Kikyo, guardian of the Shikon Jewel? The one who tamed Inu-Yasha?"   
    "Ha! Inu-Yasha was never tamed by my hand. I only gave the proper tools to the one who could."   
    The storyteller shook his head in disbelief. "Whatever you did, this is amazing! This is the very village that Inu-Yasha destroyed so many years ago, is it not? This is where my legends start, for I tell of the greatest of half-demons of all time, Inu-Yasha!"   
    The villagers, many of whom had grown up fearing that name, gasped in surprise. Kaede, however, shook stared at the man in amazement. "Inu-Yasha? Greatest? Perhaps the most ego-ridden, and if you got your stories from him there is little doubt that it will be more than the merest tripe!"   
    "I do indeed hold my stories from the demon himself. And I did not say 'greatest of demons,' nor 'greatest of men,' but 'greatest of half-demons.' And so he was, for no other half-demon aspired as he did to be both demon and human, ultimately failing to achieve either one when he was closest to the answer. For, he held the Shikon Jewel in his very hand and did not use it to become demon, and he held in his grasp the means to make himself human, but dared not use it."   
    Kaede studied the man for a moment longer before nodding as if having confirmed something for herself. "Very well, young man, come and break fast with me. After that, you may have this porch for your story. And it had better be a good one, for those of this village well remember the greatness of the demon Inu-Yasha, and the destructive power he possessed even as a half-blood. I doubt much will impress these villagers."  
  
    Having eaten his fill of the plain but hardy fare offered by the priestess Kaede, the storyteller sat down to his work. He had ignored the attempts at speech made by Kaede and her shrine maiden, a woman of thirty years who made the meal and served the priestess as a general helper. He though, instead, of the story he would have to tell, and of Kaede's comment. He came to a decision, eventually, to win the village over with a unique and tragic story, rather than an adventure, for, as the center of Inu-Yasha's operations towards the end of his career, the village had certainly had enough of adventure to be bored by a tale of such made by one they had seen often.   
    After the meal, the storyteller and the priestess moved outside, he to the porch, and she to the front of the small audience that had gathered there. "All right, gather 'round (if you haven't already) and hear my tale. No stragglers? Good. Now, I am sure that you have all heard of the great demon Inu-Yasha. He is well known for days around, and this is, after all, the place where the greatest part of his legend began. However, despite what you may know of his adventures and his public life, there was a great story of romance, tragedy, and betrayal, all of it true, that occurred right here. This is the story of the demon Inu-Yasha and the priestess Kikyo."   
    All eyes turned to Kaede, but she stared ahead impassively. The villagers soon followed her example. "Many of you may know the basic story," the talespinner continued, "but there is much you do not know. I will start, as any good storyteller should, from the beginning.   
    "Now, most tales start with 'long ago,' or 'far away,' but this tale does not start with either of those for every moment of it took place within ten miles of here and the story occurred not even a century ago. So, not too long ago in a place not so very far away, there lived a half-demon by the name of Inu-Yasha. He was very good at being a demon, and he longed for nothing so much as to become one by full blood. This, of course, was not possible as his father, one of the most powerful demons of all time, had become enamored of a human woman who became Inu-Yasha's mother.   
    "One day, however, Inu-Yasha heard a tale of a jewel that could be used by demons, one that could make a half-demon so powerful that the humanity within would be no more than a flyspeck compared with the demon's greatness. This jewel, the Shikon Jewel, was in the hands of one who could not use it, a mere human, and a woman besides, a priestess named Kikyo. So it was that Inu-Yasha came to this village to take the Shikon Jewel from Kikyo. Unfortunately for Inu-Yasha, Kikyo had been chosen as the Jewel's guardian for good reason, and many demons, some more powerful than Inu-Yasha, had already been defeated by the priestess.   
    "'So,' thought Inu-Yasha, 'I am not so powerful as I should be, but I am more cunning than any four of those other demons put together. I shall take the jewel!' Apparently he overestimated himself. No smarter than two and a half of the other demons, at the most." The villagers laughed as though they had forgotten how. The man smiled softly. A good story should hold them so in thrall. "Inu-Yasha did not take the Jewel, but unlike the others, he survived to try again. And again. And again. And… Well, you get the idea.   
    "This continued for a long time. It became almost routine, and Inu-Yasha would worry if Kikyo was not in place to be attacked and Kikyo if Inu-Yasha did not attack. They became so comfortable in the routine that they began to talk during their battles, first to hurl insults, then to catch up on the news, and even, eventually, simply to speak to one another.   
    "One day, Inu-Yasha set up an ambush, one that he knew Kikyo could not possibly detect. He lay in wait for the priestess and, sure enough, she came up the path into the forest where he lay. Before he could leap, however, she called his name. Sure that he had somehow been detected, he cautiously approached Kikyo, close enough to talk, but far enough away to dodge her arrows and flee into the forest.   
    "'So,' he said, 'you detected my ambush.'   
    "'No, it's just that you're always there.' Then, she asked Inu-Yasha a question: 'Do you think I'm human?'   
    "'Of course!' said Inu-Yasha. 'What else could you be?'   
    "Kikyo explained then what it was like to guard the Shikon Jewel. She must never let her guard down. She must not hate nor love. She must give up her humanity to guard humanity. And Inu-Yasha was the same, she went on, forcing his humanity away, trying to stop it from existing. The half-demon left that evening with much to think about.   
    "Over time, Kikyo and Inu-Yasha became closer. He still made token attempts to steal the Jewel, but they spent more time talking. He even assisted her on occasion in the defense of the Jewel. One day, he admitted to himself what he had been hiding from the world for what seemed like an eternity: he had given in to his humanity. He was in love with Kikyo. And, despite the enigma that encapsulated the priestess, one can only conclude that she must have felt the same way, for she told Inu-Yasha the greatest secret of the Shikon Jewel: in the hands of a half-demon, it could be used to purify, to make the half-demon wholly human. After such use, the Jewel would either be purified so that no demon could use it, or it would be completely destroyed.   
    "So it was that, a week after telling this to Inu-Yasha, Kikyo approached him and arranged to meet him in the forest near the old bone eater's well. There she would give him the Shikon Jewel and he would make himself human. The burden that Kikyo had carried all her life would be lifted and Inu-Yasha would be free to feel and act as he ought, as a man to a woman." Here, the storyteller paused, a look of contemplation on his face.   
    "But that's not what happened, was it?" a child in the crowd called out. His mother tried to shush him, but the storyteller waved her off good-naturedly.   
    "No, indeed, that is not what happened. For, at the same time as Inu-Yasha hunted the Jewel, there was another who wanted it just as much, one whose power and cunning were both such as to make Inu-Yasha look like a mere dog. That demon's name was Naraku, the void, and such he was. As a void, he had no shape to call his own and was forced to borrow the shapes of others. Rather than a curse, though, he used it as a blessing: the ability rather than the necessity to take other forms.   
    "So it was that, on the appointed day, Kikyo approached the appointed spot where she was to meet Inu-Yasha. While still on the path, Inu-Yasha came upon her and attacked her to steal the Jewel. She fended him off, but not until she was badly injured.   
    "And so it was that Inu-Yasha, as he waited by the bone eater's well, was attacked by Kikyo, uninjured and powerful. He managed to escape, but he did not leave. He felt betrayed. He had allowed himself to love, and now the one he loved had betrayed him. Well, in that case, he would fight back. He attacked the village and destroyed much of it before Kikyo managed to drive him back. She took this attack as more evidence of his betrayal. And so, Kikyo tracked Inu-Yasha into the forest and shot an arrow into his heart, binding him to a sacred tree for all eternity by a spell that could only be broken by her own soul. Such was her last act for, even as Inu-Yasha began to sleep the sleep eternal, Kikyo breathed her last and was burned along with the Shikon Jewel to keep it from the hands of demons forever."   
    "But, why did Inu-Yasha and Kikyo betray each other?" The storyteller looked up at the innocent child in the front row. His head had fallen in sorrow at the end of his story as if he could remember the event, although he looked forty years younger than Kaede, who had been a young girl herself at the time. "Didn't they love each other?"   
    "Yes, they did. When Inu-Yasha was awoken fifty years later and learned that Kikyo was dead, despite the act of indifference he showed, he felt such sorrow as he had never felt before. No, Kikyo was attacked by Naraku who used Inu-Yasha's shape to get close enough to try to take the Jewel. And when he was unsuccessful, he used Kikyo's shape to attack Inu-Yasha in hopes that he would kill the priestess. Naraku would have had no trouble taking the Jewel from Inu-Yasha with Kikyo dead. It is fortunate for the world that the Jewel was burned with Kikyo and did not come back until another guardian had been born."   
    The entire village was silent for minutes more, until Kaede, the priestess, spoke. "Well, I am impressed, young man. I knew that story already and it moved me. I imagine it was quite an experience for everyone else, especially the young ones. You may stay in the temple tonight, if you wish, and eat with me once again."   
    "Thank you," the young man said, "I think I will. However, I must be on my way at dawn, so if your lovely assistant would be so kind as to make me something tonight that I can eat on the road tomorrow morning…" The shrine maiden giggled and nodded, then shook her head. "Well, which is it to be?"   
    "Yes… But only if you tell another story."   
    "Well, I think I can swing that. After supper, however; my throat is overworked as, I hope, are your emotions."  
  
Part II  
  
    The storyteller had retreated into the temple and most of the villagers gone on their way, but Kaede stayed in the square mulling over the story. It had been so very well-done, almost as if the man had been there…  
    "Mistress Kaede!" The priestess looked up to see a young woman with odd clothes walking towards her. Even if she had not known the girl for so long, there was no mistaking that outlandish garb.   
    "Kagome! How good to see you. Have you been here long?" Normal though Kagome might look to the untrained eye, Kaede knew that the young woman was from several centuries in the future. The clothing she wore, though strange to the priestess, was considered normal where she came from. Kagome was also one of the most important characters in the legends of Inu-Yasha: she was a reincarnation of Kikyo, she had been the one to awaken him from his slumber and break Kikyo's spell, and she had been the one he had accompanied on the quest for the shattered pieces of the Shikon Jewel and to whom he had been forced to bow by Kaede. She had also been in love with Inu-Yasha, and he with her, which was why Kaede could never figure out why the half-demon had disappeared from her life as soon as their quest was over.   
    "Not very; I caught about half of the story. He's good; I just about cried, and I knew it already."   
    "Yes, me as well."   
    "However, there's something about him that I can't quite place…" Kaede nodded. She had felt so as well, and she had noticed that Kagome's feelings on such matters were even more accurate than her own. "I want to try something. After he tells his story, I want to tell one of my own. Make sure he doesn't leave."   
    "What do you have in mind?"   
    "I'm not completely sure yet. And… Well, I think I have a better idea than you of just what is wrong with the man, but I don't think I could take it if I'm wrong about this one. Just trust me, okay?" Kaede nodded and entered the temple; Kagome settled down to wait.  
  
    Two hours later, the village had gathered again for another story, for, as Watuwill had stated, "I may be telling the story _because_ of one person, but the story is told _for_ all." The storyteller set himself up in front of the temple once again, sat down in his chair, and promptly fell out of it. He peeled his face off the ground as his audience laughed, looked around suspiciously, but saw nothing and sat back down. He did not notice the smiling figure in the back of the crowd.   
    "All right," he said when he thought that he had regained enough of a serious atmosphere, "today seems a day of endings for me. Just as I have told you of how Inu-Yasha and his love Kikyo were tricked into believing they betrayed each other and destroyed each other, so now shall I tell of how Kagome, who was Kikyo reborn, left this world and the demon.   
    "As you may know, Kikyo was reborn many hundreds of years in the future as Kagome, granddaughter of a priest who guarded the bone eater's well within his temple. When Kagome fell through the well in her time, she came out of it in this time where she awakened Inu-Yasha, caused the Shikon Jewel to be rediscovered and shattered, and found the shards of the Jewel with Inu-Yasha's help. All things must come to an end, however, good or bad, and one day Kagome found herself in possession of all of the Shikon Jewel, reunited and reassembled.   
    "There was just one problem: many demons had come near to claiming part or all of the Shikon Jewel as their own during their quest. How could such a thing be prevented in the future? The only option Kagome could see was to live as Kikyo had, sacrificing her humanity for the safety of the Jewel. She could not allow even Inu-Yasha or Shippo to gain possession of the Jewel lest the temptation become too great. She thought on this constantly as they made their way from the site of the final shard to the bone eater's well deep in the forest to the east of here.   
    "What she could not know was that Inu-Yasha held an answer to her dilemma, though he feared to use it. He remembered what Kikyo had said of what would happen if the Shikon Jewel were used to make a half-demon human, but he would sacrifice his powers and, perhaps, make Kagome feel obligated to stay with him in this time were he to make himself human. Finally, when they reached the bone eater's well, Kagome turned to him, and he looked in her eyes, and he knew that he could not leave her to the half-life Kikyo had been forced to live to protect the Jewel. And he knew how to save her from this fate and the obligation to stay in this time." The storyteller fairly radiated melancholy, as if the decision were his own and not his character's.   
    "You see, every half-demon has a time when they lose all powers and become simply human. For Inu-Yasha, this was the first night of the new moon. He knew that most of his demonic features were unobtrusive and that his hair, which was white, but turned black when he became human, would not simply change color, but be replaced. The white hair would cover the black for a time.   
    "So it was that he offered to destroy the Shikon Jewel. 'I know of a way to purify the Shikon Jewel,' he told Kagome. 'If you give it to me, I can make sure that it is either purified so that no demon may use it, or destroyed beyond repair or use.' At first, Kagome refused, for Inu-Yasha had been hunting the Jewel for a long time to increase his powers, but finally he said, 'I swear on the Tetsusaiga, my father's sword, and on the black pearl, my father's grave, that I will not use the Jewel to make myself a full demon or to increase my powers.' Knowing that this was a vow that even Inu-Yasha would not break, Kagome reluctantly gave him the Jewel.   
    "Inu-Yasha took it, and he held it in his hand, and he told it to make him human. The power of the Jewel flowed through him, and for a moment he felt the incredible power of it, and his companions feared that he had gone back on his word. Then, however, the power stopped, and Inu-Yasha gained the feeling that came over him every new moon. He opened his hand, and the Shikon Jewel lay there, as perfect as ever, for several moments before dissolving into dust and blowing away on the wind. Inu-Yasha bade Kagome farewell then, and she made her way to the well and her own time." The storyteller was silent for a time, and some of the audience became restless, feeling that the story might be over. However, just as one or two people stood to leave, he came back to attention with a start and began speaking again.   
    "When Kagome had gone, Inu-Yasha turned to his companions and bade them farewell as well. He thanked them for their service, and for their companionship, and he turned to Shippo and gifted him with the Tetsusaiga. 'You are a good demon,' he said, 'which is a rare thing. This blade can only be used by a demon, and only in defense of a human. I know of no other who could use it with any reliability.' The fox-demon protested, as did the priest, the tick, and the raccoon, but Inu-Yasha insisted that he now had no use for it.   
    "While the others pored over this odd behavior, Inu-Yasha walked away. Once out of sight, he pulled the white hair off of his head and tied it in a bundle which he took with him so as to leave no trace. When he had put considerable distance between himself and his friends, the newly-made human burned his hair, removing all traces of the demon Inu-Yasha from this world. He found a village, and found a living, and now lives among mortals as one himself, though none has yet discovered just where or who he is. And so ends the legend of Inu-Yasha."   
    Watuwill fell silent and bowed his head, indicating that the story was over. The crowd began to break up as quietly as they could, not wanting to break the mood that still held sway over them, but a young woman suddenly strode forward to the temple porch. She stepped up beside the storyteller, startling both him and the crowd. "Quite a story from quite a talespinner!" the woman announced. "And quite enough for any person in one day. However, I have one more tale for you to hear." Watuwill began to slip away nervously, but Kaede was suddenly beside him, gripping his arm.   
    "When the Shikon Jewel was destroyed, Kagome went back to her world to settle all accounts so that she could live in this one with the one she loved. Unfortunately, fate had other plans, and she found her love had disappeared in her absence. She searched in vain for over a year before returning to her time. She lived in both worlds, balancing the comforts of home with memories of her time with Inu-Yasha, and always searching for the half-demon who could make her forget all others.   
    "For seven years she searched, never giving up hope." The storyteller had finally managed to break away from Kaede and was trying to run around back of the temple. "But now, the search is finally over - _SIT_!" the storyteller fell to the ground and the woman grinned, "and I've found him."   
    "I can't believe this thing still works," Inu-Yasha muttered, fingering his necklace. Then he looked up at Kagome, then down at the ground. "I- I'm sorry, I thought-"  
    "You obviously didn't think!" Kagome fell to her knees and embraced Inu-Yasha as hard as she could; he returned the hug awkwardly. "Dammit, Inu-Yasha, I don't feel obliged to stay here because you gave up your humanity to me; I _love_ you! There's a difference!" She was sobbing now.   
    "I'm sorry," Inu-Yasha said again, beginning to cry himself. "I just thought, how could someone like you like someone like me?"   
    "Love knows no boundaries." Then both fell silent and merely sat enjoying the feeling of closeness that they had been deprived of for so long.   
    Kaede stepped between the couple and the crowd, allowing her to disperse them and give the two loves a modicum of privacy. "Please return to your homes," she said, "and allow these two to work out their relationship on their own. You know," she continued, "all of you have been singularly blessed today. You are witnesses to the true end of a legend."  
  
  
  
    Just a little something I thought up. If there's anything wrong or missing here, don't blame me too much; I'm only on the sixth VIZ graphic novel translation.  
  
And remember:  
  
        '_Vincit amour omnia,  
        regit amour omnia.
_'  
  
  
            'VioletEyes 


End file.
